Search - Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex

Man do I love some Mary Roach. The woman writes great, funny, infotaining* books. It's true that I had to cross my legs and read through squinted eyes to get through some passages (it's as much about sexual dysfunction and painful stuff doctors think of to do to genitals as it is anything else), but I enjoyed it.

Somehow, though, this book seemed to lack a focus. Maybe that was also true of Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers and Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife, and I just didn't notice it, but each chapter just was about its own thing without much building into any greater understanding of 'the curious coupling of science and sex.'

On the other hand, I still loved it. Make of it what you will.

* Remember that neologism? Or, I guess, more accurately, infotainment? It really seemed to be catching on for a while, and now it's nowhere.

As a reader, I usually find well-written books of non-fiction to be informative and, at their best, very readable and enjoyable. With Mary Roach's books, I have to add adjectives not often applied to non-fiction: addictive, consistently entertaining, often laugh-out-loud funny. Her subjects are distinctly off-center, her research exhaustive, and the results are wonderful!

After reading her ultra-informative and ultra-macabre "Stiff", I had to track this book down; there's no way it couldn't outdo the all-inclusive work on the fascinating life (afterlife?) of cadavers. Kudos to Mary and her husband for giving it their all for some 'first-hand research' involving MRIs. Warning: if you were at all squeamish during some of the more disturbing incidents in "Stiff", certain chapters in this tome will make you very uneasy (I practically had to cross my legs and gird my loins through most of Chapter 8). Mary holds nothing back, and is constantly hilarious in her treatment of practically everything you always wanted to know about sex but were afraid to ask. Highly recommended, but don't leave it where the young kids can find it.